INDUSTRY CHALLENGES – THE NEED FOR AI

The UK construction sector is a diverse industry which includes mining, quarrying and forestry to the construction of energy and transport infrastructure and buildings, the manufacture and supply of products, maintenance, operation and disposal.

Unfortunately the sector suffers from a workforce skills shortage. Many people have left the industry – either having retired or moved onto other role. Fewer skilled workers are returning to the industry and training the next generation is a daunting challenge. Equally those that are left are increasingly over-stretched handling multiple projects at a time, with limited resources and time.

There are hundreds of different operation, safety and construction management software tools and applications on the market for the industry to choose from. They can help to improve coordination aspects, communication, and streamline defined roles and accountability.

However they all have limitations:-

No intelligence applied to the data to either make informed decisions or make the decision on behalf of the project Existing packages are at best data analytical and reporting tools which present data in varying formats but no more than glorified spreadsheets and graphs Often data is captured manually No account is taken of the many and varied data sources that are available Often from small data sets No direct interpretation between the contract requirements and data being processed and presentedExisting tools and methods are subject to the quality and method of data inputted i.e. only as good as what you put in Often difficult to use which can be off-putting No consistent industry standard Do not embrace the whole of the “project”

The combination of the skills shortage, together with an absence of any step change performance improvement tools or systems has led to increased inefficiencies and losses in the sector and a deteriorating safety performance. A total of 144 workers were killed at work in Great Britain in 2017/18 – an increase of 9 fatalities from 2016/17.

A KPMG report found that only just 50 per cent of all construction projects come in on time, budget and within scope (KPMG 2010), and typically the sector operates at 3-5 per cent inefficiencies equating to losses of £4 bn pa. in the UK.

Industry leaders and innovators have expressed the need for future tools and applications to improve safety and operational performance.

THE AI OPPORTUNITY

Recognising the staggering potential of the 4th Industrial Revolution (Artificial and Cognitive Computing), Aurora has become a leading developer of Real-world Artificial Intelligence systems that provide tangible outputs. They help to provide consistent textbook contract administration, improved safety and operational and asset performance. The systems have been created with our IT partners who include IBM and the University of South Wales using game-changing cognitive computing systems. As well as traditional data it captures unstructured data which accounts for 80 per cent of data available today; for example audio, video, social media, point cloud surveys and GPS data.

We’ve considered how AI can be applied to an industry like utilities and construction that is generally slow to adapt, in comparison to sectors such as financial or medical. One of the most significant factors in project programme overruns and poor commercial performance is inconsistent project management actions and decision making. The cognitive management approach eliminates this and provides a robust and consistent approach every time.